Cathy Krafft……..-..Sharing My Journey to Life

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Archive | August 2014

“In 1990, Ferguson, Mo. was a middle class suburban enclave north of St. Louis with a population about three-quarters white. In 2000, the town’s population was roughly split between black and white with an unemployment rate of 5%. By 2010, the population was two-thirds black, unemployment had exceeded 13%, and the number of residents living in poverty had doubled in a decade.

The situation there is “really not so different than the rest of St. Louis County,” said Dr. Norm White, a criminologist with the Saint Louis University School of Social Work. “The problems we saw in the urban core have become the problems of the suburban umbrella.”

“The same decay that sparked unrest in one Missouri town is taking place across the country.”

On the surface it looks like what’s going on in Ferguson is all about racism, but it’s important that we have a look at the fact that Ferguson’s poverty and unemployment rate is worse than the national average.

“Ferguson is just the place that the scab got pulled off,” White, the criminologist, tells TIME. “The reason why this is so intense is that there are a lot of these little communities that have been left almost to rot. Physically the buildings are falling down. There are no social service programs.”

What can we really expect from people who are struggling in unimaginable ways such as living in poverty and homelessness? How come it’s so difficult for us to talk about the fact that having little to no money, with no end to the struggling in sight, how come this is not seen as a motivating factor embedded within the anger and the fears of the people of Ferguson?

I think mostly people are desperate and scared because they don’t know what to do or where to turn for help with their day to day struggles to survive. So when someone is killed like in a case like this, all hell brakes lose and still, we have the nerve to overlook the facts as their thrown in our face of how Poverty leads to War…

Truth is, what’s happening in Ferguson looks like war because it is war and it’s important to see the facts. And the fact is, our current Money System has failed us and we have to realize that what’s happening in Ferguson is happening in one way or another all around our world. The poor are getting poorer while the rich are getting richer and it’s important that we get clear on the fact that War is Not, never has been and never will be the solution.

The solution will no doubt require us to come together as a Group, to Support each other in bringing about a Money System that acts according to what’s best for all.

“There is nothing more dangerous than to build a society with a large segment of people in that society who feel that they have no stake in it; who feel that that have nothing to lose. People who have stake in their society, protect that society, but when they don’t have it, they unconsciously want to destroy it.” MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR

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“I was very much clearly convinced; in spite of what I saw in the police which was murders and violence and all kinds of things. I saw that more than just an outflow, more just an outflow from the social condition and the lack of resources, the lack of money that caused most of the conditions that I have witnessed in the police. People simply did many of the things out of desperation.” Bernard Poolman